


Carpe Diem

by MissAnnThropic



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode: s04e06 Window of Opportunity, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-11-02 19:07:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10950861
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissAnnThropic/pseuds/MissAnnThropic
Summary: Jack takes one more loop off after he kisses Sam in the control room.





	Carpe Diem

**Author's Note:**

> General Warning: I will not tag to your satisfaction. I think tagging is out of control, and I will not tag a fic to the point of spoiling what happens in a fic. I’m an old-school reader who believes the story should be able to surprise you. If that’s a deal-breaker for you, turn back now.
> 
> Cross-posting: I do not consent to have my fics posted to other websites (such a Goodreads).

Jack didn’t always tell anyone that they were looping. He got tired of explaining it (and sick of the physical exam the truth always earned him). He wouldn’t argue that some of it might have also been mental instability. Turned out reliving the same day over and over again was enough to drive anyone nuts.

Jack felt like he’d gotten awfully close to cracking there.

He and Teal’c knew they had to eventually buckle down and solve the problem – they were literally the only ones who _could_ – but Daniel had planted a seed when he commented that they could do whatever they wanted without fear of consequences.

Jack thought maybe it was a saving grace that Daniel made that offhand remark when he did. The opportunity to blow off steam was quite possibly life-saving.

Jack would never tell anyone that the thought had crossed his mind, but when he contemplated the possibility that the cycle would never be broken, he wondered if it would still restart with him back at the beginning if he blew his brains out during a loop.

He hadn’t been close to actually doing it. Not yet. But he had peeked down that dark alley while he was wondering how long it would take for him to literally go insane. And he knew he was a man who would not shy from that as a last resort.

But free loops promised a much-needed reprieve.

He and Teal’c were smart about it. As smart as they could be at their point of mental exhaustion, anyway. They agreed upon a set number of loops to take off so no one did anything heroic or brilliant that broke the cycle while the other may have done something irrevocable.

If he didn’t focus on the interminable rinse and repeat pattern that had become his life, Jack kind of enjoyed the freedom the time loop afforded him. He was somehow always too busy in his regular life to fit in everything he wanted to dabble in, and then the universe handed him _this_.

Lemonade from lemons, as the cliché went.

The pottery had been fun. Dirty and hands-on and _relaxing_ where Jack’s regular life was dirty and hands-on and life-or-death.

Riding a bike through the SGC? That had been that weird impulse in the back of his head, there since day one for inexplicable reasons, and he thought maybe now that unending yen would stop because he’d finally _done it_.

Golfing through the Stargate was an improvisation, because of course the day that ended up repeating was a rainy one in Colorado. Jack didn’t like to think about the possibility that the rest of his existence (if one could call it that) would be forever raining.

A couple of loops he feigned illness and just went home and _slept_. Because the time block that kept repeating meant Jack had gone weeks (months?) without sleep.

He waited until the last loop he and Teal’c had agreed to take off to hand Hammond his resignation in the control room. Part of him thought it was so he could go out with a bang (so to speak). Another part of him thought he saved it for last so he wouldn’t be tempted to press for anything more on a subsequent loop.

He wasn’t sure how Sam was going to react to him kissing her. They had their unspoken _thing_ , but it was always the elephant in the room that no one talked about. He supposed there was a kernel of doubt that she would push him away. Even if it was just in surprise, the rejection would be hard to take. Maybe he waited for the last loop for that reason – so if she did push him away, he would have the translation work waiting in the next loop to distract him.

But Sam _didn’t_ push him away.

 _She kissed him back_.

Knowing she would reciprocate if Jack finally said ‘fuck it’ and went for it was… well, maybe he hadn’t really thought that one through. He only realized as she curled her hand around the back of his neck and opened her mouth under his that he would now have to live with the knowledge that if he just up and _kissed her_ , she would kiss him back.

That was dangerous information.

Which was why when the next loop restarted, Jack stood outside Daniel’s lab waiting for Teal’c. They were supposed to get back to the translation work this loop, but Jack had other plans.

When the Jaffa came around the corner and strode up to Jack, the colonel didn’t waste time (there was both too much of it and not enough). “I need another loop, T.”

Teal’c stood a moment regarding Jack, that wise and penetrating look in his eye.

Teal’c couldn’t know what Jack had done in the last twenty seconds of the last loop, but somehow he seemed to know anyway. He lifted one quietly questioning eyebrow.

Jack just shrugged. He’d thought a quick stolen kiss would be enough, but the moment his lips touched hers he knew it _wasn’t_. He needed more time.

“Are you certain this is wise, O’Neill?” Teal’c finally asked.

“I’m pretty sure it’s not, but… I have to do this.”

Teal’c watched him a moment longer, then he finally nodded. “Very well.”

Jack nodded with an exhale and patted Teal’c on the shoulder. “Thanks, Teal’c.” He’d known Teal’c would help him out. And he knew Teal’c wouldn’t ask any further questions. Teal’c was just awesome like that.

With that and a girding of loins, Jack set off down the corridor to find Sam.

It was difficult to talk Sam into leaving the SGC, given that they had a mission scheduled, because Jack wasn’t willing to make it an order. He didn’t want to pull rank. He _refused_ to. Sam seemed baffled that he was keeping his authority in check, almost frustrated when she copped an attitude and he didn’t do anything about it. 

He suspected she finally relented and accompanied him off base out of curiosity about his behavior more than anything. It was doubtless a tactic toward discovering the reason why he was acting so strange.

He drove them back to his house in the rain, where he finally told Sam about the loop. After explaining it so many times, he was pretty good at anticipating all her questions. He’d perfected getting the pertinent information across in the most efficient way possible.

Sam was fascinated – she always was – but sitting on his couch instead of at the base brought her back to the real problem pretty damn quick.

“Sir… if what you’re saying is true, then shouldn’t we be back at the SGC trying to figure how to stop this time loop?”

Jack tried not to stare at her mouth, trapped in the memory of the feel of her lips. “We will. Teal’c and I have already spent what seems like an eternity with Daniel translating the Ancient writing on that device on the planet, and when the loop resets we’ll get back to it… but not this loop.”

Sam gave him a perplexed look.

“Teal’c and I needed a break. We were both losing our minds.” At Sam’s dubious look, Jack rolled his eyes. “All right, fine, _I_ was going bonkers.”

Sam smiled a little, but her expression sobered when she realized there was no glimmer of humor in Jack’s eyes. He really wasn’t kidding about the ‘going nuts’ thing. He could only imagine how weary he must look to Sam.

“I can’t even imagine…” Sam mused aloud with a small headshake. She looked at him closely. “How many times have we looped?”

“Daniel asked that, too. You know, I honestly lost count.”

“That many?” Sam seemed worried by his answer.

Jack nodded.

“Wow… no wonder you were going crazy.” She cast a sidelong look at him. “So how are you now?”

“Now?” Jack took stock. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s been fun to blow off work and get in trouble for silly shit, but fact still remains that me and Teal’c are the only ones who can fix this. Which _sucks_. We’d all be better off if the loopers had been you and Daniel. Hell, we’d all be out of this by now.”

“Maybe… maybe not.”

“Oh, there’s no maybe about it. Daniel would have had that device translated ages ago, you would have worked out the science on how to undo this, and voila.” Jack made a vague gesture.

Sam offered a touched smile at his absolute confidence in her abilities but didn’t say anything. The sound of rain pattering against the windows filled what would have otherwise been an awkward silence. Sam seemed at a loss for what to do now that Jack had brought her home and explained the loop thing.

She had to be thinking this was all stuff that could have been discussed on base. He was still working on how to broach the subject he’d really wanted to discuss.

“So…” Sam said, beating him to the punch, “what did you do?”

“What’s that?”

“On the loops you spent goofing off? What did you do?”

Jack fought a smile. “Oh, this and that… rode a bike through the SGC, hit a golf ball through the Stargate to Alaris.”

Sam snorted.

That tense silence fell again, and this time Jack knew he had to break it.

“Actually…” Jack shifted on the couch to face her more directly. “The reason I wanted to talk to you alone –” Sam’s head came up and her eyes widened in justifiable concern “ – is because of what I did on the loop before this one.”

Sam gave him a wary look. “Uh oh. Should I be worried?”

“Yeah, probably.” Jack winced and wiped a hand over his mouth.

“Oh boy…”

Yep, pretty much.

“There’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just…” Jack stared at Sam a moment, stymied, then he gestured toward her and blurted, “I kissed you.”

Sam’s mouth popped open.

“Technically, I resigned first. _Then_ I kissed you.”

Sam’s eyes skittered around the room before returning to his. “Oh… uh, wow…”

“Yeah.” He waited and watched her reaction closely.

Sam brought a hand to her lips ( _not helping_ ) and idly ran the pads of her fingers over them, as if she could feel the kiss of which he spoke. Her eyes were on her lap, making it hard for Jack to guess her thoughts.

Finally, she looked back up at him. At least she didn’t look _mad_ … that was something. “Why are you telling me?”

“Because it’s not like you’re going to remember this conversation when the loop starts over,” Jack finished her thought. “Hell, you don’t even remember the kiss that, from my perspective, happened just a couple of hours ago.”

Sam nodded.

Jack flapped his hands in surrender. “I’m not really sure, honestly. I guess I didn’t know what to expect when I marched into the control room and laid one on you.”

“The _control room_?”

Jack couldn’t help a devilish smirk. “Yeah… bet big or go home, right? It’s not like I’d have to answer for it later, anyway.”

Sam gaped.

“I hadn’t thought beyond just _doing it_ ,” Jack continued. “I was caught up with the whole ‘no consequences’ thing. I didn’t ask myself what I’d do if you didn’t kiss me back.”

“Of course I kissed you back.”

Jack drew up short and looked over at her. Sam looked grim in her certainty that she had, in fact, kissed Jack back. Regardless of the public nature of the gesture, despite her surprise at the spontaneous act… she had no doubt she had kissed him.

Which meant she’d known all along that she _would_ in such a situation.

“ _Ah_ ,” Jack mused in realization.

Sam put her elbows on her knees and pressed her fingers against her mouth. A furrow of displeasure was creasing her brow that had Jack concerned about the direction of her thoughts.

“Carter…?”

“You didn’t think,” Sam began with carefully measured words, “that it wasn’t fair that you would get to remember it and I wouldn’t?”

“I _did_ … as it was happening.”

Sam huffed and folded her hands under her chin.

“I put _a lot_ more thought into it when we were…” Jack sighed and raked a hand through his hair.

Sam pursed her lips but didn’t comment.

“Look, Sam… that last loop was supposed to be the last one we took off, but after the kiss… I told Teal’c I needed one more.”

Sam sat up abruptly and turned a look on him. “Why?” The suspicion and hurt look in her eyes had Jack scrambling when he realized what she was thinking.

“ _That’s_ not why,” he said, somehow indignant that she would think he just wanted more than a kiss from her. “The truth is, when you kissed me… I realized how shitty it was of me to do that to you. To share something with you that you would never remember.”

The hurt overpowered every other emotion in Sam’s face.

“I just… I had to tell you… which doesn’t even make sense, because you won’t remember _this_ either, but _I_ needed to say…” Jack trailed off in frustration and pinched his temples with one hand.

“Say what?” she asked lowly.

Jack dropped his hand and studied her intently. “That I don’t think of us as a joke. Which that kiss… it started off like one, but it stopped being anything even close to one really damn fast.”

Sam winced.

“Listen, maybe I’m just not thinking straight thanks to this whole loop thing, but I want you to know that I…”

Sam turned to face him and gave him her full attention.

Jack took a breath and went for it. “I love you.”

Sam’s eyes blew wide.

“And I know you won’t remember that, either, but I needed to tell you. I needed to explain that I didn’t kiss you because I was just screwing around and you were _convenient_. Just because there were no consequences for what I did doesn’t mean I didn’t mean it. So I wanted you to know…” the truth made Jack’s insides hurt, “because I may never be able to tell you when this looping ends.”

Sam stared at him in shock. He didn’t blame her. He’d lived with the same day repeating for countless cycles, but to Sam, it was a normal day. And under normal circumstances, Jack would _never_ say that to her. It just so happened that Jack’s will was worn down to the nub and he couldn’t bother holding back anymore.

At last, Sam got a thoughtful look on her face and narrowed her eyes at him.

“What?” Jack asked.

“So this day is going to start over in a few hours, and everything we say and do is going to be wiped clean, right?”

Jack nodded wearily.

Sam pondered the implications of that a moment before she spoke. “I love you, too.”

Jack’s mouth huge agape. “Uh… what?”

Sam smirked. “What, you think you were the only one?”

“Well, _possibly_. I mean… we both knew there was an _attraction_ here, _attachment_ unbefitting our ranks and all that, but I didn’t know you, uh…” _Loved him_. Because frankly, it made sense for him to be far more gone on her than she was on him. She was _Carter_ , for crying out loud. The woman who spoke the language of the stars. While he was a damaged old colonel fifteen years her senior with bad knees and an irreverent sense of humor. 

“Jack…” she said in fond exasperation.

The sound of his name on her lips went right to his groin. “I, uh… I didn’t know,” he stammered.

“And now you’ll have to live with knowing,” Sam said thoughtfully. She began to frown as she considered that. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, you… I mean, is it going to make keeping my hands off you harder? Er… I mean, more difficult? Yeah. But…” he couldn’t help a small smile. Sam _loved him_. That knowledge was worth any agony it brought him. “I’ll take the pain.” Knowing Sam loved him just might be the lifeline he needed the next time his life got shitty (because it always did).

He knew from experience the love of a good woman could carry him through hell.

“I don’t _want_ to cause you pain,” Sam lamented.

“I know. And I wish… Well… I just wish.”

Sam nodded miserably, wrought by the burden she’d just placed on him, then she suddenly looked up at him with a glimmer in her eye. Jack knew her well enough to know the look of Sam when she got an idea. And he knew her mind well enough to know it was going to be a doozy.

He cocked his head. “What?” 

Sam was suddenly in his personal space, pressing herself against him and capturing his mouth with hers.

Jack was parting his lips for her before he had time to think, an instinctive response to Sam’s mouth on his. Maybe like Sam’s reaction to his kiss in the control room, actually. His hands came up and cupped her face as hers slid down his chest while her tongue flicked against his.

Sam angled her head for a deeper kiss and shifted closer to him on the couch, her hand trailing down to his cotton-clad stomach. Jack threaded his fingers into her blonde hair and coaxed her closer.

Sam threw a leg over his lap and straddled him, and suddenly Jack was all nerve-endings and sensation. A lapful of Sam Carter was enough to short-circuit any man’s brain, and Jack was spinning off into space.

They kissed like horny teenagers for a minute before Sam rocked her hips against him, eliciting a grunt when she dragged against the impressive hardness he was sporting. “ _Sam_ …” Jack growled against her mouth.

Sam smiled and her hand dipped down to his fly.

“ _Wait_ ,” Jack yelped and grabbed her wrist frantically to stop her.

Sam pulled back and stared into his eyes, the blue of her irises reduced to rings of blue around black, like twin solar eclipses. “What’s wrong?”

“We can’t.”

“Actually, we _can_. No consequences, remember?”

Jack groaned and pressed his forehead against hers, still holding her wrist trapped in his hand. “Sam, please…”

She settled back in his lap, not to grind on him but in lax surrender.

He opened his eyes and looked up at her. “You have _no idea_ how much I want to… but I can’t. Not if you won’t remember it, too.”

She looked wounded for a split second, then she let an unguarded look of love shine through.

Jack dropped his head against the back of the couch with a groan. He let her wrist go and somehow his hands found their way to her hips. He just wanted to feel her, warm and solid under his hands. He couldn’t let her take things further, but he wasn’t ready to let her go, either.

“This is the only chance we might have to do this, and we _still_ can’t. It’s not fair,” Sam muttered as she lightly pet his chest, as if she too couldn’t stand to stop touching in some fashion.

“Story of my life,” Jack agreed roughly.

Sam was conspicuously quiet a moment. “What if I said I was okay with it?”

Jack lifted his head again to look at her. “I’m not. I won’t do this without you.” And if she wouldn’t remember being with him, it would be like she’d never been. He couldn’t live with the memory of her body while no spark of that same illicit encounter lived in her eyes.

Sam smiled softly. “You’re a good man, Jack.”

“Not as much as you think,” Jack grumbled. “Because I’m already kicking myself for passing up this window of opportunity.”

Sam lowered her eyes with a smile, her gaze inevitably falling to his tented pants. Her mouth softened and her eyes went impossibly darker. He could see her entire body radiate _want_.

Her gaze was like a touch and sent a renewed wave of eagerness to Jack’s _sidearm_.

“All right,” Jack groaned as he started to nudge Sam back toward her side of the couch, “you’re, uh, going to need to give me a couple minutes in the bathroom.”

Sam climbed off his lap and settled on the cushion next to him. A wicked gleam lit in her eyes. “Can I watch?”

Jack’s problem damn near solved itself right then and there, and he’d be damned if that happened. He hadn’t come in his pants since he was a teenager. He shot Sam a look. “For crying out loud, Carter!”

Sam giggled, and Jack couldn’t even chastise her. He was too busy thinking about hockey and Major Samuels in drag.

Jack stood up and awkwardly adjusted himself. Sam brazenly watched him do it, like she wanted to do it for him, and Jack kind of hated the universe that they couldn’t have each other. “I’ll, uh… be right back.”

Sam, flushed, got up, too. “Yeah, actually, I need to use the guest bathroom…”

Jack stared hard at her.

Sam met his gaze head-on. He did not mistake her meaning.

“ _Son of a bitch_ …” Jack hissed.

Sam lifted her chin in challenge. “Take it as a compliment,” she said before she disappeared hurriedly down the hall and closed herself in the hallway bathroom.

Jack practically dashed to his own bathroom, knowing the knowledge of what Sam was doing just across the hall would make his problem a spectacularly short-lived one.

When he was done and had recollected as much composure as seemed feasible, Jack went back to the living room and found himself alone. He sat on the couch and waited awkwardly for Sam to… finish.

When she came back, blushing and a tad disheveled, his heart gave a forfeit lurch. She owned him, despite the fact the Air Force would never allow it.

“So…” Sam cleared her throat as she reclaimed her initial spot on the couch. “What now?”

Jack looked at his watch and noted the hours left… for once, it seemed too few. “Would you spend the day with me?”

And she did. They sat too close on the couch watching movies and ate take-out straight from the containers without bothering with plates. They stole looks at each other filled with understanding and love. For the first time, neither one of them tried to mask their feelings for the other.

Jack had imagined Sam looking at him lovingly before, but the fantasy paled in comparison to the real thing. Jack realized his perfect life would be Sam looking at him like that every day.

When the time loop was finally broken, Jack couldn’t decide if he would treasure the memories it left behind or curse them. It was going to be hard seeing this day undone.

When the hands on his watch moved dangerously close to the loop reset, Jack became tense.

“Is it time?” Sam asked, noticing his demeanor.

“Yeah.”

Sam looked stricken, like she wanted to fight against their day being taken from her.

Jack felt a little sick.

Sam moved closer to him and gently framed his face with her hands. “Jack… remember something for me.”

“Okay.”

“I love you.”

He forced a smile. “I know.”

Sam leaned in and pressed a chaste, quick kiss to his lips. “Remember that I loved you yesterday, too.”

Jack managed a real smile then. The loop had begun to feel like a world removed from his own after so many repetitions, but Sam was unchanging beyond its grip. Her love had been there before this nightmare started, and it would still be there when it ended. 

Maybe they couldn’t take this day with them, but he could take that truth and carry it over.

Jack turned his face into her hand and kissed her palm.

Sam just about melted.

“One day…” Jack vowed as the world took on a blast-white brightness.

**********

“What are you smiling at?”

Jack couldn’t hold back a tiny smile. “Nothing.”

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: So, this note is mostly unrelated, but I feel like I need to find solace with my fellow Gaters here. For many, _many_ years, my mother and _all_ of my friends have given me a hard time about finding RDA attractive because RDA and my father happen to look a lot alike. But it’s not like I can help it! What am I supposed to do, just _not_ think RDA is sexy? Because you see how ridiculous and impossible that is, right?? Okay… that’s it. Rant over. Hope you enjoyed the fic!


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